SB Nation User Blog: goingforthecorner

Texas vs Iowa, Pittsburgh, and Rice GameFlows

goingforthecorner — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 06:24:05 -0000

Apologies for taking forever. GhostofBigRoy has already posted his own Pittsburgh and Rice gameflows with analysis, so be sure to check those out. I've already made my own gameflows for the games, and planned to post them all in one fanpost after I finished the Rice one. Little did I know that Ghost was already making his own. Anyway, here are the gameflows for the last three games, with some of my own brief thoughts:

Texas vs Iowa

Click here for Texas vs Iowa GameFlow.

via i48.tinypic.com

Player	+/- game	+/- per minute
Varez Ward	+22	+0.88
Damion James	+20	+0.69
Justin Mason	+14	+1.08
J'Covan Brown	+13	+0.68
Avery Bradley	+13	+0.57
Gary Johnson	+10	+0.45
Dexter Pittman	+10	+0.67
Alexis Wangmene	+9	+0.90
Jordan Hamilton	+5	+0.25
Dogus Balbay	+4	+0.24
Matt Hill	+4	+1.33
Shawn Williams	+1	+0.25

Texas vs Pittsburgh

Click here for Texas vs Pittsburgh GameFlow.

via i49.tinypic.com

Player	+/-	+/- per min
Gary Johnson	+19	+0.86
Dexter Pittman	+18	+1.00
Avery Bradley	+14	+0.48
Jordan Hamilton	+12	+1.09
Damion James	+8	+0.24
Justin Mason	+5	+0.29
Dogus Balbay	+4	+0.14
J'Covan Brown	+3	+0.13
Alexis Wangmene	+3	+0.18
Matt Hill	-6	-3.00

Texas vs Rice

Click here for Texas vs Rice GameFlow.

via i50.tinypic.com

Player	+/-	+/- per min
Avery Bradley	+21	+0.81
Damion James	+20	+0.77
J'Covan Brown	+19	+0.61
Dogus Balbay	+17	+0.59
Dexter Pittman	+13	+0.50
Gary Johnson	+3	+0.19
Alexis Wangmene	+2	+0.25
Justin Mason	0	0.00
Shawn Williams	0	0.00
Matt Hill	-2	-2.00
Jordan Hamilton	-3	-0.16

Thoughts...

I'm glad I could put these three gameflows on the same page. Anything you notice in common for all three games? Check out the last few minutes of the first half for all three games - not good. We've been outscored by 21 points combined in the last minute or so of the last three games. Once is a fluke, twice is a trend, and three times is a habit. So what's the problem here? I don't see many issues with the rotations Barnes is using here, other than playing Matt Hill. It seems we lose our focus and intensity late in the half. Thankfully, our performance towards the end of the 2nd half is the complete opposite - utter domination. If you had to have a bad ending to a half, you'd choose the 1st half obviously. Still, it would be nice to see this pattern come to a stop.
Is Jai Lucas still a luxury? I think we may need him to win the whole thing. With Varez Ward out the rest of the year (led the team in +/- in the Iowa game), Mason and Balbay will naturally get more minutes until Lucas is eligible. Hate to bash on the glue guys, but they are partially responsible for the team going into offensive funks. With a guy like Lucas who can create his own shot anytime without need a set play, and a guy who I believe can stay on the court and get consistent minutes since he can play the 1 and the 2, he could be the final nail in the coffin in this team commanding bragging rights of having one of the most explosive and deepest backcourts in the nation.
How should Barnes control the shot distribution of the team? Is it better to be extremely balanced the way it was in the Rice game? No one took more than 10 shots, yet 5 players took 7-9 shots. Is a completely even shot distribution a good idea for this squad? Or would we rather have one or two players emerge as the primary scoring options? In the NBA, they say you need stars (at least 2) to win a championship. Does this concept apply to our team? I can't even figure out which players would or should emerge from this insanely deep roster. Ideally, Pittman would be one of them given his undeniable size and power. As far as guards/forwards go, you have the senior James, and diaper dandies in Bradley, Brown, Hamilton, and Lucas. Either way, this is a heck of a lot better than watching A.J. Abrams turn into a volume shooter last season. My level of intrigue is at an all-time high.
I pretty much have the entire month of December off from work, so hopefully I can get back to posting the gameflows within a few days after the game. With some big time non-conference matchups coming up, I have an idea of also including the opposing team's players in the gameflow. Twice the work, but I think it'll be worth it.

Cotton Bowl appears to be Oklahoma St. vs Ole Miss

goingforthecorner — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 17:31:15 -0000

Cotton Bowl appears to be Oklahoma St. vs Ole Miss

"DALLAS -- The AT&T Cotton Bowl Classic matchup will feature Oklahoma State and Mississippi, a source close to the game confirmed Tuesday.

The Jan. 2 game will be played at Cowboys Stadium in Arlington for the first time. The selected teams won't be made official until later this week or after Saturday's Big 12 and SEC championship games.

Ben Wells out, Chiles doubtful for A&M game

goingforthecorner — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 21:20:25 -0000

Ben Wells out, Chiles doubtful for A&M game

"Texas backup safety Ben Wells will miss Thursday's game at Texas A&M with an injury to his right ankle.

Texas head athletic trainer for football Kenny Boyd also said that wide receiver John Chiles is doubtful with a right ankle injury.

Starting cornerback Aaron Williams has been cleared to play after being hobbled by a right knee injury. Williams, who started Texas' first eight games this season, has been replaced by Chykie Brown in the Longhorns' starting lineup."

Credit to poster ToY on shaggybevo.com Bumped. If anyone has problems with the flash being on...

goingforthecorner — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 05:24:48 -0000

Credit to poster ToY on shaggybevo.com

Bumped. If anyone has problems with the flash being on the front page, drop a note in the comments. Otherwise, love yourself some Avery Bradley. I love myself some Avery Bradley. --GoBR--

Texas vs Western Carolina Gameflow

goingforthecorner — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 21:58:44 -0000

Click here for the Texas vs Western Carolina gameflow

via i45.tinypic.com

Here are the game leaders (by +/- per minute)

Johnson +1.16, +22
Wangmene +1.00, +11
Mason +0.96, +22
Brown +0.86, +18
Ward +0.84, +21
James +0.79, +23
Hamilton +0.79, +11
Bradley +0.65, +11
Balbay +0.55, +11
Williams +0.50, +2
Pittman +0.47, +8

My observations after the jump:

The top performing players for the most part were the hustle players, glue guys, defensive role players. This should tell us that our defense had a bigger impact on the game than our offense, and that doesn't come as a surprise given Barnes' comments of specifically focusing on defense in recent practices. In addition, this should also explain the amount of minutes Ward and Mason earned, along with the lack of minutes of Bradley, Hamilton, and Pittman. Specifically with Mason, while his box score looks rather empty, I think Barnes likes what he sees on the defensive end.
I really want to give props to Johnson and Wangmene. Johnson was the only player to not be a part of a 5-man unit that did not accumulate a negative +/- in the entire game. It's clear based on recent articles about him that he knows his role. Don't expect him to throw up a bunch of mid-range jumpers like we saw last year. He's going to focus on his defense, rebounding, and intangibles to help the team. I'm happy to have him for two more years. Wangmene is becoming a significant defensive force in the paint with his long arms. Had a block shot in 11 minutes and altered other shots. With these two guys and Pittman, our front court defense is probably top 10 in the nation at least. The ability to limit easy baskets in the paint alone will win us a ton of games this season.
My question is how long will this minute distribution continue? Will the younger, more offensive talent players get more playing time as the season continues even if their defense fails to improve dramatically? If the offense struggles against better competition, will Barnes be willing to go to the younger guys, or be loyal to his veteran players (reminiscent to Mack Brown's decision-making a few years ago)? You would think an influx of talent would make the game easier for Barnes, but the expectations for this season and his decision-making on minute distribution and units will be a huge challenge to deal with throughout the year.
Like PB said, we did not do a good job in utilizing Pittman (only played 17 minutes), and these numbers show he was actually the most unproductive as far as +/- per minute goes. This is personally disappointing to me considering he didn't get into foul trouble, and only had 1 turnover. Before the game I looked at Western Carolina's roster and noticed a huge size advantage for Dexter, and yet we did a poor job taking advantage of it. How much of this is on Pittman (his defense, lack of confidence from other players in getting him the ball)? How much of this is on the players around him getting the ball? Does Barnes even want to revolve the offense around Pittman? Some could argue it is not a good idea because Dexy clogging the paint could take away the skill-set of some of our other players.
I liked that we didn't have a single rotation accumulate a negative +/- in the entire second half despite the game being in blowout mode the entire half. Are you watching this, UT football?

Texas vs UC Irvine Gameflow (+/- stats included)

goingforthecorner — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 05:24:15 -0000

Bumped. Great stuff. --GoBr--

First of all, I would like to express my disappointment that no site I can find is recording player +/- statistics in college basketball. Please let me know if you do find one so I can save myself the time.

Until then, assuming I do have time, I plan on posting the +/- stats of our players after every game, using the official play-by-play data on texassports.com.

What's my motivation to do this? Well quite frankly, this is easily the most intriguing season of UT basketball that I can think of since I've been following the team. This team is absolutely LOADED. How can you not envy Rick Barnes? Then again, coming up with the best 5-man rotations with this team can be a challenge. I hope these +/- stats can help us come up with our own analysis regarding this deep team, such as which rotations are the best, which players had the greatest impact on the game, and which players' impact goes beyond the typical box score.

If you follow the NBA, you should check out the Gameflows created on popcornmachine.net. Here's the gameflow from the recent Rockets vs Lakers game for example. It doesn't just list the +/- for each player. It goes through the entire game, listing all the rotations and the performance of each. It illustrates critical aspects of the game such as huge runs. I followed this concept and created a "gameflow" of my own on a spreadsheet.

I plan on posting this spreadsheet after every game, so please don't hesitate to suggest improvements on the look of it. I tried to make it look pretty. Anyways, without further ado, here is the "gameflow" for the Texas vs UC Irvine game.

Click here to view the Texas vs UC Irvine gameflow

via i38.tinypic.com

My attempted analysis after the jump...

Before I discuss the results, the number in parentheses next to the name is how many minutes the player accumulated. Positive +/- in green, negative in red. I've also highlighted in green/red any rotation that gained/lost 5 or more points. Everything else should be self-explanatory, but just ask if you're lost. Here are the best performances as far as +/- goes (lets keep in mind that this stat isn't some ultimate stat to show Player X > Player Y, there's so many other variables involved). Lets not make too many conclusions as this was the first game vs UC Irvine.

Pittman +35
James +31
Balbay +29
Hamilton +27
Bradley +25
Ward +22
Brown +18
Mason +18
Williams +14
Johnson +10
Hill +5
Wangmene +1
Dick 0

A few things stand out to me:

I know there's a few Dogus Balbay haters on here, but his impact on the game was significant despite the box score suggesting otherwise. It was critical early that he took care of the ball, after J'Covan Brown's wildness and early 4 turnovers to start the game. Rick Barnes yanked Brown immediately and inserted Balbay, and we played well (led the team in assists too with 6, and did not turn the ball over). He took care of the ball, and his team played well when he was on the court, as the spreadsheet shows. Surely this will give Barnes confidence to continue playing Balbay when Brown struggles. For those on here hoping that the huge influx of PG talent would severely reduce Dogus' playing time, this game was bad news.
At the same time, there's no need to worry about Brown, despite his +/- being significantly lower than the rest of the starters. As you can see on the gameflow, he started out as an ugly -9 due to his turnovers. Early on, we only ate into our early deficit when he was on the bench and Balbay was in there. However, from midway to the 1st quarter and on, his +/- was a +27, which fits right in to the rest of the starters. He was the PG for the most part when we blew the game open in the last half of the 1st period.
This spreadsheet illustrates the key points of the game that led to the blowout. Our 23-0 run in the 1st half mainly employed Pittman, James, Brown, Hamilton, Bradley, and Ward.
Dexter Pittman is the most important player on the team. His skills cannot be replicated by any other player on the roster, so it's absolutely critical for him to stay out of foul trouble. Not surprised at all to see him lead the team in +/-, as he was simply unguardable in the paint.
It appears the best 5-man rotation in this game was Pittman, James, Hamilton, Bradley, and Brown. That's really good news for us, given they were the top 5 players in minutes played, and will probably become our eventual starting lineup. Many here proposed this exact lineup to start, so good job.

Anything else you BONers notice? Comments? Like I said earlier, I do plan on making these gameflows after every game. Can't really make a whole lot out of these blowouts, as the 2nd half was complete garbage time. I'm definitely looking forward to making these for the huge non-conference showdowns and big conference games.

RB Ryan Moats should be the full-time starter

goingforthecorner — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 20:32:56 -0000

That's it. I've had it with Slaton's fumbles, and Kubiak has as well. Slaton simply does not deserve to be our starting RB. I would use him sparingly in screens, or if we ever run the wildcat, but that's about it.

Moats might be faster than Slaton, is great at finding holes, and DOESN'T FUMBLE THE FOOTBALL.

I will be pissed if he's not leading the RB depth chart next week. This should be his job to lose, period!

Poll

Who should be the starting running back?

Ryan Moats

45 votes

Steve Slaton

23 votes

68 votes | Poll has closed

Bill Simmons' NBA season preview (Rockets)

goingforthecorner — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 22:08:57 -0000

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/part2/091023&sportCat=nba

Here's what he has for the Rockets. Daryl Morey ranks #12 in "Most Intriguing NBA People"

12. Daryl Morey
On paper, the Rockets look like a lottery team. Their best player (Yao) is gone for the year. Their second-best player is probably never going to be the same. Everyone else is a role player or an overachiever. But they do certain things really well: shoot threes, defend the hell out of perimeter guys, play unselfishly, pound the glass, stuff like that. It's one of those "whole is greater than the sum of its parts" teams. I am picking them to win 44 games and make the playoffs. Which brings me to my point: the '09 Rockets took the Lakers to a seventh game operating with half a salary cap (because Yao and T-Mac were out). The '10 Rockets start out with 80 percent of a cap because Yao is gone; that number might shrink if T-Mac can't successfully come back. And yet, I am still picking a hodgepodge group of non-All-Stars to win 44.

Why? Because of Morey (or as he's more affectionately known, Dork Elvis). He's been like a hot guy at a craps table for two solid years. Nobody else is nailing 85-90 percent of their moves big and small. Nobody. Since he's my friend, he's doing so well that I am starting to worry about a Bud Fox-like meltdown; right now he's at the point in "Wall Street" when the Talking Heads song is playing, his stock picks are hitting and he's decorating the fancy New York apartment with Daryl Hannah. We haven't gotten to the part when his ego swelled and he took on Gordon Gekko yet. And maybe that won't happen.

I just know this: He texted me last month that Chase Budinger was for real; two years ago, I would have mocked him. This year? I nodded. Absolutely. Chase Budinger. Why not? I have learned not to bet against Dork Elvis.

I'll go with that. If we can continue to play at an elite level at home like we did last year without T-Mac/Yao, and then McGrady can return and give us a huge offensive boost, we can up that win total to the upper 40s.

[ESPN] Horns face first test in Red River Rivalry

goingforthecorner — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 18:18:18 -0000

[ESPN] Horns face first test in Red River Rivalry

Summary: We can't evaluate Texas until they play a ranked team.

The Kevin Durant Conundrum

goingforthecorner — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 22:07:30 -0000

Very well written article by Henry Abbott of TrueHoop on ESPN. He's a stats oriented basketball analyst and a Portland Trailblazers fan. While I say this is a good article, I'm sure many will dislike his analysis of Kevin Durant, which mostly focuses on plus-minus statistics.

To make it short, according to these statistics, KD's impact on his team (Oklahoma City Thunder) is significantly negative. In fact, his team according to these +/- stats performs better when he's on the bench. WTF!? indeed. The article address many of the counterpoints you'd think of, such as Durant's +/- being horrible since he's on a bad team, the number of minutes he plays, the fact that he has to carry the load, etc. What's interesting though is how his teammates' +/- along with 2, 3, 4, and 5-man rotations having decent +/- 's that don't include him.

Like I said earlier, there could possibly be some bias here, as Abbott is a Blazers fan and is definitely trying to justify the Greg Oden draft selection. Whether you agree or disagree with his premise of KD's extremely negative contribution to his team, it sparks a good debate about statistical analysis in basketball, specifically these +/- stats and how we should really interpret them. Why do these stats reflect so poorly on him when it appears he's a top 10 player in the NBA? A conundrum indeed.

Here's the original article:

The Kevin Durant Conundrum

KD got a hold of this article and is obviously disturbed by it, and he "tweets" the following (I also saw this on his facebook fan page).

Everybody that is doubtin me as a player and my team as a whole..all i can say is that we all are tryin and workin our hardest!

What more do u want? let me be the player i am...i come to practice everyday..and push myself to my limit, God has put me n a gr8 position!!

I love all the REAL basketball fans who appreciate hardwork, passion and love for the game..and not jus "plus and minuses"...wateva dat is!

Abbott writes another fantastic article in response to these tweets, where he not only explains the statistics, but does it in more of a basketball language. As us Longhorn basketball fans already knew, despite his incredible raw talents, he still has a lot to work on. Specifically, he needs to improve on his defense and pick-and-roll execution. The fact that many of his teammates perform better when he's off the floor suggests he's not doing a good job at making his teammates better. So we can see he's not there yet, but there's no reason to believe he won't get there. In Abbott's response article, he mentions other stars that went through similar struggles, so KD is in good territory.

Here's Abbott's response to Durant's "tweets" (sigh).

Memo to a Young Baller